The D.S. Lights, are big and bright...

Last week, Texas State Technical College made a minor splash in the industry by introducing a degree available for students interested in pursuing a career in the Digital Signage industry. The press release is woefully inadequate in providing detail on the courses available for a degree — three different certifications are available. Reading that the students “…will take courses in Adobe Photoshop, Flash and Premiere which will allow them to create graphic content for delivery through Digital Signage Systems,” I thought Sacre Bleu! Tools do not make the artiste! Knowing Adobe products will not make you good at Digital Signage.

I went to TSTC’s Digital Signage Degree site and perused the coursework to see if this degree has merit.

The first semester in the first year emphasizes an overview of multimedia. There is no mention of Digital Signage until the second semester with a course in “Digital Signage Systems: a compare and contrast of different digital signage systems and the selection as needed for environment, lighting, and purpose. Topics cover resolution and network considerations, as well as the computer system and digital storage media for digital signage systems.”

The third semester has a strong focus on digital signage content management including mobile devices. The lone semester in the second year has one course relating to Digital Signage, “Advanced Digital Signage Content Management.”

Out of 20 total courses, only five are focused on Digital Signage, and three of those in one semester. If you remove the third semester, this could very easily be degree coursework in digital imaging and graphics. TSTC knows marketing, mixing together a few courses and adding the moniker “digital signage” to make a new degree that would attract students. I have no doubt that every effort will be made to make sure this degree is worth the $5,000 the student will pay to get it (or $12,000 if you’re out-of-state).

But, I see potential issues. Training on Digital Signage must include education on viewer marketing, research, and measurement. It is a “Digital Signage Technology Associates Degree,” but knowledge of your audience is crucial education for anyone who wants to be a part of this industry. Why talk about advertising and sales promotions if you’re not going to understand who’s watching? This becomes even more important if the student learns about content playlist creation and scheduling (available in Year 2, Semester 1 – Advanced Digital Signage Content Management).

In the final semester, TSTC offers a course in job search skills, “to seek and obtain employment in business and industry.” Do the TSTC faculty members have connections in the industry that will allow the students to get a job quickly, or does graduation come with, “Here’s your degree. Don’t let the door hit ya…”

With all of this, three questions are stuck in my head:

1. Who will teach the Digital Signage courses? Industry veterans who can provide the real-world background that makes a technical college a valuable place to learn? Or an expert in technology with no real background in the industry? I would feel much more comfortable if I knew that the educators are (or were) in the trenches.

2. This industry, and the technology utilized, is evolving so fast that the degree will be like the computers in the classroom – obsolete the day the students start using it. Will the degree provide the students with the capability to adapt the day they leave the school?

3. Would you, Mr. or Mrs. Digital Signage Industry Company Executive, hire a student with this degree?

Reading through the course offering, this appears to be a good foundation of knowledge that a student could carry into the industry.

But, like all college degrees, students should be prepared to unlearn and relearn everything for this industry. We’re still writing the textbooks as we grow.

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This post covers day two of the Digital Signage Content Strategies Summit. You can find Day 1 here.

Day Two of the Content Strategies Summit seemed to be two things overall: First, a practical application of some of the best practices (Target’s Mark Bennett showed a dozen clips that emphasize his best practices) and a much deeper dive into theory and research.

It’s not Point of Sale, it’s Point of Experience.
In 45 minutes, Al Witteman, Managing Director of Retail Strategy at TracyLocke, showed me that the next step in understanding the impact of digital signage and DOOH is to leverage the incredible research behind shopper marketing. It is widely known that approximately 70% of all purchase decisions are made in the store. Mr. Wittemen’s argument is that the emtire environment is the sales pitch, not just a sign on a shelf. Instead of creating “Digital Signage,” he would like the industry to use the term “Digital Experience.” (This may be a late entry into Dave Haynes’s post about what to call ourselves.) The environment has morphed into a holistic engagement device designed to ensure that your decisions are certain, perfect, and will have a positive impact on your loyalty in the future. It’s not “point-of-sale” any longer. It’s “Point-of-Experience.”

What I learned: This is the next phase of digital signage/experience. The industry has spent the past several months grinding away at the basic foundation of what it takes to put the content in the environment, but has yet to really work on impact – what makes the customer tick, and how we can create interactive and engaging experiences. Al asked which one of us would go into work, apply shopper marketing insights, put a stake in the ground, and drive the industry to the next level.

I will. I hope others will too.

Target is Spot On. (Pun intended.)
Mark Bennett, Group Manager of Media Production for Target, presented Target’s best practices for Channel Red, Target’s in-store multi-channel network. His points confirmed much of how we should conduct our process for digital signage (I echo several of his points in managing my own programs). But what struck me about Mark’s presence at the conference was not so much the presentation, but the fact that another major retailer is coming forward to learn and educate on industry best practices.

You can find a detailed account of his presentation on Bill Gerba’s site here, written by Christie Liu. The article opens with, “In a rare appearance…” I think Target’s presence will be much more frequent. Like Peter Müller-Brühl’s discussion on Mercedes-Benz during Day 1, major brands will help shape the future of this industry and lay a foundation that all retailers (even the small ones) can model after. I hope that Mark and Chris Borek will continue to drive the industry forward.

What’s more valuable? CPM or REM?
Paul Ryan, President of Retail Engagement Architects, in collaboration with Retail Media Consulting, presented a solid argument for understanding the value of a message. By creating a grounded process by which measurement is achieved (not just imagined), we can move from measuring reach (CPM) to Relevance, Engagement, and Measurability (REM), or Impact.

What I learned: Building the understanding of impact starts in the process, not at the store. By creating a process aimed at a measurable result, you not only get your desired results, but you will also set the standard by which other content impacts the viewer. Plan for measurement now, not after it hits the store. An important lesson, indeed.

The Five Items You Need In a Supermarket
Remember that I asked you to list those five things you need tonight at the market? I’ll take a stab at what you wrote: bananas, milk, juice, eggs, cereal. Those were my five. Here’s the question: How many of those are listed as brand name items (instead of “juice,” you wrote “Tropicana”)? Chances are you wrote very few, if any, brand names on your list.

Hearing Mr. Witteman speak about shopper marketing research opened the door for me to see where I think the industry needs to look to build impact and value with content. Christopher Gray, Psy.D., Vice President, Shopper Psychology with Saatch & Saatchi X, signed, sealed, and delivered that message.

Dr. Gray explained how we have the potential with Digital Signage (Experience?) to fill in that brand name blank. With the shopping exercise, he was, “demonstrating that brand preferences are not guarantees once a shopper is confronted with all of their choices at shelf. The fact that we tend to write down categories of items rather than specific brand names is significant and suggests that on some level, consciously or subconsciously, we are not fully committed.  As a result, there is room for influence. How to do that successfully is where the real work begins.” When we walk in a store, we not only have a frame of mind about what we want, we spend a considerable amount of time “deselecting” extraneous brands and products. That deselection state is a death knell for brands.

How can Digital Signage help brands avoid the deselection phase?  Dr. Gray presented a compelling series of arguments on how digital signage can keep a brand at the forefront of the customer’s mind when shopping.

Echoing Mr. Wittemen’s statistic that 70% of all purchase decisions are made in the store, and with a time span of approximately three seconds for the shopper to move into that area of impact and make that decision, how can we utilize digital messaging to cut through the clutter? Thought provoking, to say the least.

Quite frankly, Dr. Gray’s entire presentation is a series of blog posts on its own. His insights on shopping behavior and how Digital Signage relates to those behaviors was nothing short of fantastic. I hope we hear much more from Dr. Gray, Saatchi and Saatchi X, and TracyLocke.

What I learned from this: With the need to understand evolving customer desires in an ever-changing environment, we must embrace the experience and expertise of marketing insights. We can then truly begin with the end in mind.

Oh, and I need to get Tropicana 100% Pure and Natural Orange Juice with Some Pulp at the market tonight. In case you’re wondering, that’s one out of 64 Tropicana Juice and Drink varieties I can choose from. My head hurts. A little.

Context Comes First
Rob Winston, Senior Account Manager for Arbitron Out-of-Home, explained that if content is king, context is emperor. Without context, you lose the efficacy of content.

Mr. Winston noted that our culture has moved from content consumers (watching ads on a program pre-TiVo) to content customers (actively deselecting those pieces of information we choose not to see/hear). It warrants a discussion on what we consider engagement. Mr. Winston believes that engagement is where the audience makes a commitment, not just a response.

All of this wraps into context, something that seems obvious, but in reality is very difficult to achieve. How many of us have hung a TV somewhere in a public space because we knew viewers wanted to see something cool on it, and how many times did we actually consider the space around it? I’m guessing all of us have been down that road before.

Mr. Winston provided a set of simple questions that we should be able to ask and answer in any given situation where we plan to provide the customer with a digital experience:

1. Who is your customer?
2. What are they doing?
3. What do you want them to do?

If you apply these questions not only to the screen but the environment around it, it’s easy to see Mr. Winston’s compelling argument that research lives inside context, and even the best creative won’t work without it.

What I learned: The paint on the wall is much more serious than just a color. It could very well be a deciding factor in whether or not you sell anything with your screen.

The Summit – Final Thoughts

This was the first slide of Mr. Wittemen’s presentation, and I understood it as soon as it popped up on the screen.

The industry has seen its fair share of “how to” white papers. I have read dozens of them myself. But I believe this summit called attention to the “why behind the buy,” and the need for the industry to leverage that information. Regardless of the presentation or source, every single person the stage brought more than just a pretty piece of video to look at. We heard insight on why content was created, why the customer needed to know something, and why something worked or failed.

What was refreshing was not hearing suspicions about the agency’s role in the process of content. Historically, agencies have been trying to find their place in the industry, and they (and we) are still working out the kinks. But having them at the same table as technology experts, retail experts, and industry insiders makes me believe their role in the future of this industry is extremely valuable and growing.

There was a strong contingent of retailers and agencies in attendance, and a few production houses as well. What I saw was a common thread to understand that content can only be king when we have the following: Absolute mastery of the audience based on meticulous research and shopper insights; completely streamlined technology that allows us to create unique experiences and distribute to specific channels of interactivity; and common measurement metrics that work for both large and small environments alike.

And finally, that none of this can happen without everyone at the table.

Easier said than done, I know. But doable.

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The focus on understanding the value of content was paramount. I sat next to a gentlemen who asked me, “So how would I go about getting digital signage in my stores?” Needless to say, many colleagues, myself included, gave him a notebook worth of thoughts on the next steps.

There were so many salient points that I have broken this up into two posts, each covering one day. Look for Day 2 Friday.

DAY 1

The show started with hearing the agency perspective, providing insight into creative storytelling. Conor Brady, SVP and Chief Creative Officer with Organic, summed up the idea of creative workflow by saying, “the message is convergent; the experiences are divergent.” I think that was a terrific introduction to the entire conference, explaining how we work to go from one-to-many messaging to one-to-one engagement.

If Content is King, Distribution is King Kong.
Peter Müller-Brühl, Business Development Leader for fisherAppelt, tv media in Germany, explained that content can only succeed when the right channels for deployment are in place.

In describing the distribution challenges Mercedes-Benz faced with sending content to all the local showrooms, Mr. Müller-Brühl and fischerAppelt partnered with dotflux Group to distribute HD content in a segmented fashion to locales that do not have high bandwidth.  Mr. Müller-Brühl states, “We as the agency produce about 5 to 15 gigabytes of full HD content every month, and [dotflux] distributes this over the existing dealer network-connection (many of them have less than 1 megabit for their entire dealership). They use some kind of grid-computing approach, so no infrastructure investments are necessary, neither locally at the dealer, nor centrally at a play out center. Usually the network costs go up exponentially when you use full HD quality at more then a dozen locations.”

What did I learn from this? I learned that while content may be important to me (the retailer, or end-user), distribution is at the forefront of many minds, especially advertisers and agencies. The pretty pictures are nothing if it doesn’t get there.

A Template for Customization
The highlight of Mr. Müller-Brühl’s presentation was his description of providing HD (yes, HD!) content to the dealerships with text fields for variable messaging. This allows the dealers to customize the message for their environment.

Mr. Müller-Brühl described how Mercedes-Benz dealers around Germany installed televisions to watch the World Cup matches in 2006. Once the tournament was completed, all these showrooms were left with TVs and no content. It was a challenge to Mercedes-Benz corporate because a network had literally popped up from nothing, and now the dealers wanted content for their TVs. The process of creating and deploying content became a major initiative, but proved successful.

The text field is designed into the creative, with the correct font and layout, so that the message, no matter how custom, feels like Mercedes-Benz made it just for that dealership. As Mr. Müller-Brühl confirms, this is “…very important because of the premium brand image”

The variable caption at the bottom can be tailored for the local store.

Watching a major brand like Mercedes-Benz execute this is important because this is exactly where retailers must go to create a customized and localized feel. I have done some of this with the network I operate, and the feedback has been tremendous.

What did I learn from this? There are right ways and wrong ways to create messaging customized for local use. If you don’t give the local showrooms an avenue for their messaging, they’re liable to create some of their own, and that could easily be “off-brand.” Instead, build a kit of parts for them to use based on brand, corporate marketing, and initiatives. And when you partner with a technology solution that eases the workload and efforts at the local level, you’ll find much more cooperation from them. And beware retailers that take it upon themselves to hang a TV. Sooner or later, they’ll come to corporate for help with content. This has happened to me at least a dozen times. It helps to have perspective on best practices for handling these cases.

The NYC Sign…Loophole?
Steve Bumstead, Founder & President of PixelFire Productions, said that if you hang a monitor outside a window in New York City, it is designated a sign. If it’s hanging inside the window, it’s not. Loophole? Maybe. But if you’re planning any type of signage in NYC, this might be something to consider…

What did I learn from this? I have built programming for both sides of the window, but never thought about this in terms of freedom of creation. Would it make more sense to move the screen to inside the store? Maybe…

While you’re at it, can you make my program, too?
Part of the first day was devoted to a workshop where we teamed up to create a network and playlist for another sector of the industry. In my case, I was on a team assigned to create a network for an Outpatient Cosmetic Dental Care facility; a stretch from consumer electronics, but I was lucky. With me at the table was an industry all-star team, among them Steve Nesbit from Reflect Systems (technical infrastructure), Al Wittemen from TracyLocke (shopper insights), Peter Müller-Brühl from fischerAppelt, tv media (business development), Bob Stowe from Wendy’s Restaurants (retail/QSR), and a gaggle of creative minds.

There was no award or contest here, only the opportunity to step away from our normal business to gain perspective on other sectors that can benefit from compelling Digital Signage.

We were given 30 minutes to take the value proposition and create a playlist based on available resources. Every team came up with a comprehensive playlist that would be easily successful in the sector they were assigned to execute.

What did we learn from this little exercise?
Begin with the end in mind and bring your experience to it. None of us at the table had personal experience with a cosmetic dental care facility, or that demographic of consumer, but by asking three basic questions – Who is the customer? Why is he/she there? What does he/she want? – We were easily able to apply our knowledge to a solution.

Even working in consumer electronics, I found myself easily transported to handling a different public space because of my awareness of the industry around me. The business proposition, the creative development, and the distribution of the network would be straightforward because all of us at the table – two had over 30 years in the industry while one was a complete novice – had the business background to develop a network based on consumer desires. As one colleague at the table said, “I haven’t been this excited about marketing in several years.”

Now I Know How to Peel a Banana.
Kent Hodder, President and Executive Creative Director of Met|Hodder, handed out a bunch of bananas at the start of his presentation, and showed all of us the easiest way to peel a banana. If you’re like everyone the room, you’ll be surprised.

Mr. Hodder’s allegory is that even in a room full of experience and expertise, we are still learning every day, and many of those “aha” moments of innovation come when we least expect it. He presented several stories based on the “aha!” moment of understanding, even bringing some of the less-than-stellar occasions to show how we learn. One quote that stood out was, “Experience is a marvelous thing that enables you to recognize a mistake when you make it again.”

Before Friday’s post, I have a little test for you. Get out a pad and a pencil (or open your word processing program on your other monitor). Here’s the test: Imagine that you need to stop by the market tonight and you need to pick up five things. Write down/type out those things right now. Go ahead, do this.

See you Friday.

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Build It. Will They Come?

Last week I had the opportunity to speak at Global Shop’s Digital Signage conference, sponsored by DigitalSignageToday.com.

Several speakers from all disciplines came to talk about best practices (and executions) in digital messaging. Here are five things I learned:

SIZE DOESN’T MATTER
Linda Hofflander, Vice President and Chief Marketing Officer for Wireless Ronin gave an outstanding presentation, “Challenging the Retail Challenge.” She suggested to never rule out a test size. The size of a test is only determined by what you really want to know. A two-store test can be just as valuable as a 200-store test. It all depends on what you want to know and how you can learn it. She’s absolutely right. At Best Buy, we have done tests with as many as several hundred stores and as few as a single store. We tend to worry that a poor size won’t validate the results. Don’t let the size of your test get in the way of learning.

7 STEPS TO CREATIVE A VALUE BASED NETWORK
Another bell-ringer from Ms. Hofflander. After learning about the challenges facing digital signage execution, you need to put the steps in motion to create a values-based network:

Self Discovery: You must know what you want; don’t expect anyone else to know.
Vision: Think BIG. Think scaleable. Think flexible. Think long term.
Reality: Know what you can do now. Rome wasn’t built in a day.
Partnering: If you know about what you want, picking a partner is easier.
Discovery: When you find the partner, show yourself and your true colors.
Alignment: We’re all on the same page.
Solution: The end result of the first six steps.

As Ms. Hofflander writes, “The original author was a client of ours, George Yunis, Senior Director, Creative Services for ARAMARK. George co-presented with Steve Goertz Sales VP from Wireless Ronin at DSE 2009 on ‘How ARAMARK Got The Digital Signage it Wanted.’ George outlined for session attendees how ARAMARK serves 15,000,000 consumers daily, operate 3,000 locations nationwide, serve 10 lines of business, and use 1 digital signage solution via Wireless Ronin Technologies.

THE ONE MORE BEER THEORY
Jeff White, owner and CEO of The Bar Channel, gave the most entertaining talk of the day, avoiding the usual rhetoric and providing a terrific, up-front attitude to understanding how to succeed with digital signage.

Jeff’s “one more beer theory” is a tangent on dwell time. Within any venue or network, the better job you do of keeping the eyes on the screen, the longer people will stand around and watch. In the case of bars, if people stick around they tend to purchase more beverages, so the financial reward to the venue is cyclical and positive: The venue earns revenue with eyeballs on the screens because the eyeballs stay in the seats because the network has great content, meaning the venue provides value to the network. Money all around.

INTERACTIVITY WITH MOBILE TECHNOLOGY AND DIGITAL SIGNAGE
This is more of an extension of what I’m learning about digital signage and mobile technology, but I was very interested to hear Steven Gurley, Vice President of Marketing at Symon Communications Inc.

In particular, Mr. Gurley proposed quick progress toward more interactive engagement between digital signage and mobile technology. Instead of the passive mode of sending a text message to a location to get more information, the return message will be a call to action for the viewer to take the next step in the experience, like being directed to a site with real rewards for the effort.

Also, we’ll see customers and viewers interact with the digital signage and change the signage right on the spot. The idea is that a customer can select something to watch from a menu of options. The customer sends a text message to a computer and the computer plays the new content.

I DID NOT KNOW THERE WERE SO MANY WAYS TO HANG STUFF IN A STORE
I took advantage of a break in the day to wander through the show floor. This was my first time at Globalshop, and I couldn’t decide what was more impressive, the hundreds of different ways to put products on a shelf, or the elaborate and truly amazing vendor booths. Can we even call them booths any more? Perhaps we should call then vendor provinces.

Traffic was low, but not unexpected given the economic situation. Yet I’m still sure plenty of business was done on the floor. I’m just happy I’m not a fixture guy for a retailer. Now that’s a job.

Overall, a very worthwhile trip, and I’m thrilled I was a part of it.

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